Dust by Eva Everson (epub e reader .TXT) 📕

“Don’t tell me—”

She pointed to the door. “Get. Out.”

His face softened and his eyes became tender again. “Cindie,” he whispered, reaching for her. She took a step back. If this was going where she thought it was going, he’d best know right up front that she wasn’t the stupid teenager she’d been when she’d faced Westley with this news. Oh, no … No man was going to sweet-talk her again. Talk her into something she didn’t want to do so he could get what he wanted … again. “Sweetheart … I’m sorry. I wasn’t expecting … this. I know you didn’t do this on purpose.” He raised his hands as if he were addressing a jury about to sequester and reach a verdict. “What we have to do now is figure out what we will do from here.”

“I know what I’m going to do, Patterson.”

His shoulders sank, the idea of losing it all—wife, daughters, career, and a mistress—weighing them down. “Look. I know a good doctor. He can take care of this, discreetly, and we’ll get back to what we had—what we have.”

She blinked. “I’m not aborting this baby, Patterson.” She laughed then. A light chuckle that came from the saddest place inside her. “You and Westley,” she said, breathing out their names as though they were poison. “I sure know how to pick ’em.” At least Westley hadn’t asked her to abort the child.

“Them. Pick them.”

“Shut up, Patterson. I know how to speak. And I’m not as stupid as you seem to believe.”

“I never—”

“Then shut up. You …” She took a step toward him. “You were never, ever, going to marry me, were you? You were never going to leave Mary Helen. It wouldn’t have mattered how old your girls got to be.” She laughed again. “I can hear it now… I can’t leave, Cindie, because the girls are too young … in school … getting married … having their own babies. Well, Patterson, I hope you enjoyed what you had since the day I walked into your classroom with a ‘yes’ practically tattooed across my chest because you’ll never have it again. You’ll never touch me. Kiss me. Love me.” She shook her head. “You sure saw me coming, didn’t you? And for some reason you thought you could use me … for how long? For another few years?”

“Stop it.”

“No.” She took another step. “You stop it. Get your shoes. Get whatever you think you have here that is yours … and get. Out.” She turned away from him, but his hand came around her arm, gripping.

“You will not walk out on me,” he told her. “And you will not threaten me, do you hear? I’ll ruin you from one end of this globe to the next.”

A moment of fear ran through her, a moment of remembering the time he’d hurt her. But what else could he do, really? How much worse could life get? She raised her chin and brought her eyes directly to his. “You will ruin me?” Cindie jerked her arm from his hold. “I suggest, Professor, that you go home tonight, snuggle up to your cold little wife, and pray to God that I don’t ruin you.”

His slap came fast, leaving a trail of heat. But she didn’t collapse, nor did she clutch her cheek in distress. Instead, she turned, somehow made her way toward the bedroom door, and then tossed over her shoulder, “Leave your keys on the table. You won’t be needing them again.”

She entered the dark of her bedroom and closed the door behind her, locking it with fingers that quivered so much they were nearly useless. Then, with her forehead pressed against the jamb, she waited. Listening … first to the slow shuffle of feet, the sitting on the sofa—was he putting on his shoes?—to the sigh of fabric as he stood, the drop of a single key to the table... She listened... until the front door opened and clicked shut.

It was over. How long had it been now? How long had they been together? How long had she been such a stupid little fool? How much time had she wasted? Or nearly wasted, since one thing she had learned had been that nothing in life is ever wasted. The good, the bad. Nothing. If you learn from it, it becomes useful and worthwhile.

Who’d said that to her? Westley? Sounded like something he’d say, but... no. Surely not Lettie Mae and certainly not her father. Vernon? No. Vernon was all about doing the right things all the time and not having to learn from the bad.

Then who?

Cindie flipped on the light switch—the one connected to the bedside lamp. A soft glow filled the corner of the room, dimming as it neared her, giving her just enough light to step over to her dresser and, without a glance in the mirror, remove first the earrings, then the necklace, followed by her clothes, which she left discarded on the floor. Like a puddle.

She pressed her hand low on her stomach. Squeezed eyes devoid of tears shut and tried to imagine a life raising a child on her own. She hadn’t been able to do it before. To do it with any measure of success. How could she possibly do it now? And how long before she told anyone? How long before she—

Kyle. Kyle had been the one to tell her about the good and the bad in life. Her old roommate and oftentimes friend. The man Patterson despised for no good reason except that she loved him like a brother.

And he loved her, too. Sometimes she thought more than as a sister, although he’d never played that card.

She turned. Spied the phone on her bedside table as a slow smile crept from the corners of her mouth. She slid beneath the covers dressed only in her bra and panties. Shivering, she picked up the phone and dialed a number she knew by heart.

“Hello,” a sleepy voice answered.

“Did I wake you?” she asked.

“Nah,”